


jump over fences and cut up our knees

by autisticlalna (mathonwys)



Series: casting a shadow (Shadow People AU) [8]
Category: Hermitcraft
Genre: Dissociation, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Jigsaw is the worst in every fic he's in, Living Shadows, Murmur uses ASL, Panic Attacks, Shadoc gets emotional support!, Shadow People AU, Temporary Character Death, emotions are hard, horrible little man.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-05
Updated: 2019-11-05
Packaged: 2021-01-23 21:16:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,793
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21326806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mathonwys/pseuds/autisticlalna
Summary: "His ideal of "better" didn't involve being remade from the ground up with the help of a diamond sword. What it did involve he wasn't sure, but Shadoc was alive and very much intending to stay that way, thanks....Except for the part where he'd died."Shadoc dies and gets resummoned for the first time since "how to kill a shadow". he's not sure how he's supposed to feel about it.(written for the Shadow People AU by mine-sara-sp on tumblr!)
Series: casting a shadow (Shadow People AU) [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1522271
Comments: 1
Kudos: 60





	jump over fences and cut up our knees

**Author's Note:**

> writing while listening to "scars" by mr.kitty is an experience im not sure i want to repeat
> 
> back on the sad shadoc content i guess! i wrote this after writing literally 1 page of caution & crisis bc it kept haunting me when i was trying to sleep. what's an emotion, can i eat it
> 
> honestly some of this is i just wanted to have doc be supportive of his shadow now that we're fully post-detonator, as well as an explanation for shadoc getting drawn with a trident-- unfortunately, a shadow needs to get resummoned to update its inventory. also murmur has been canonically confirmed by sara to glomp people so there's your info for the day
> 
> there's gonna be a follow-up fic to this sometime in the future that's... it's gonna be something! jigsaw went through a lot in caution & crisis but i am not done with him yet

Ah. He was on the floor again.

Shadoc opened his eyes just the tiniest fraction as the world spun back into focus. He was… Where was he? All of his senses felt loose and disconnected; he was aware that he was on the floor, could feel it under him and saw that the world was sideways, but feeling was still creeping back into his limbs and everything felt miles away.

This level of disorientation would be alarming to most shadows. Shadoc was, unfortunately, used to it.

He’d had a panic attack. A pretty severe one. The smaller ones he’d been learning how to manage with Cleo’s help, but there were still times where the panic would hit hard enough to completely incapacitate him. It was… inconvenient. Maybe that was understating it, but for Shadoc that was just how his life _ was _. He just had to learn how to deal with it, learn what set him off, and hope that someone would be around to help if it escalated. ...And, after Sahara, avoid complex redstone as much as he could.

He dug through his memory to the best of his ability. Where was he, and how did he get here? This wasn’t his room on Cleo’s ship, he was certain of that. It wasn’t Stress’s daycare, either, although it wasn’t like he went there that often after he stopped living with her. The only thing that made sense to him was that he was back in New New Hermitville; as it turned out, Keralis had been pretty okay with the idea of a shadow lurking around. Even after he summoned his own shadow, he’d allowed Shadoc to stay and help out around the village (as long as he stayed away from the zero-tick farm, although not for the reasons Keralis thought).

That didn’t really make sense, though. The village was_ safe_. Even the nonstop _ click click click _ of redstone was far underground, localized under a building he never went near. There shouldn’t have been anything that would have set him off, anything that would’ve led to him collapsing into a useless pile on the floor. He’d “woken up” like this from several panic attacks in the past— huddled up on the floor, senses jumbled up, his mind still struggling to process that the danger had passed— but there was always a running theme that led to him reverting to a terrified wreck; sure, sometimes the panic hit at the smallest things, but usually Murmur was there to calm him down before it snowballed into a full-blown episode.

The thought of Murmur sent a stabbing pain through his chest. Something… something had happened. Something had happened to Murmur, and now he was here.

Shadoc pushed himself up with some difficulty; his body protested, but he did his best to ignore it as he looked around. This wasn’t Cleo’s ship, or New New Hermitville, or Stress’s castle, or even Area 77, but… but he’d been here before. It had been so long ago he’d almost forgotten what it looked like. He’d initially assumed the darkness to just be because of the time of day, or maybe improper lighting, but the way the shadows cast by haphazardly placed furniture danced around him in the flickering, unsteady light of torches dug up a memory like unearthing old bones.

He was in the shadow temple. He was in the shadow temple, because he’d died. He was in the shadow temple, because he’d died, and Doc had to resummon him. He was in the shadow temple, because he’d died, and Doc had to resummon him, because

The room around him shifted as Shadoc was overtaken by a wave of vertigo and he collapsed back down to the floor. _ He’d died. _ A shudder wracked his body and he bit back a distraught cry. The one thing he focused on above everything else, the one thing he feared more than anything else, the one thing he desperately tried to avoid, had happened. Death was inevitable for the shadows: they were literally programmed to fight, to die, to come back stronger. He should’ve known this would happen eventually, should’ve known better than to let his guard down, should’ve known better than to think he’d never die again after the traps, but...

Where was Doc? His summoner had to still be here, right? He waited for the disorientation to pass before rolling over on his back and tilting his head to look in the direction of the exit. The door one of the hermits had installed (for privacy or to be an obstacle, Shadoc wasn’t sure) was shut. Had he been summoned and then immediately abandoned? But, no, that didn’t make sense. Things still weren’t perfect between him and his summoner, but he doubted Doc would just leave him here.

No. No, Doc had resummoned him, and

More vertigo. It felt like he was stacked on top of himself, clipping into himself, unsure of which set of senses he was supposed to be using and jittering between perspectives with no rhyme or reason behind it. Shadoc closed his eyes and pressed the heels of his palms into his forehead. Breathe. Breathe in— _ one, two, three, four_. Hold— _ one, two, three, four_. Breathe out— _ one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight_. Wait— _ one, two, three, four_. He repeated the pattern, focusing on the superficial motions, until he felt settled enough to try again.

_ Doc had resummoned him. Shadoc remembered struggling, reaching up out of his shadow in terror and desperation, and remembered Doc grabbing him by the wrists to help pull him out the rest of the way. He’d collapsed, then, and Doc had kneeled down next to him, and had been speaking to him, had been asking about what happened maybe, and he’d been unable to respond. Doc had been counting— _ one, two, three, four _ , maybe Cleo had taught it to him too— and then Shadoc had been able to stand up with Doc’s help. _

_ Then the door opened and _

Shadoc gritted his teeth, glittering yellow fangs shining in the dark. The beginnings of a headache was pounding like a drum beat; he did his best to try and shut it out, did his best to push through it, did his best to keep digging.

_ Then the door opened and someone had walked in. Doc had rounded on them, furious, yelling at them for being so careless— _ careless _ ? Shadoc had stood still, rooted to the spot, as his summoner went off on the other hermit. Something about their shadow— the summoner had been careless, someone had gotten hurt, _ ** _Shadoc _ ** _ had gotten hurt, and _

Ah. He was on the floor again.

Shadoc blinked, his expression blank. He’d died. Something had happened— something involving Murmur, something that hurt too much to try and think about— and he’d died. Doc had resummoned him, there’d been an argument, and… and he’d panicked. There wasn’t anything in the shadow temple he could overload, at least, so he’d just… shut down. Doc must be on the other side of the door; if he focused hard enough, he could hear voices talking in low whispered tones— the continuation of the argument that had likely come to a sudden stop once Shadoc had been hit with a metaphorical blue screen of death.

Did he feel any different after being resummoned? Shadoc wasn’t sure. He’d never really had the chance to try and comprehend his own progress as it happened; each previous death had been so rapid-fire that he’d barely had any opportunity to catch his bearings before the next death hit him like a freight train. He knew, in the vaguest of terms, how it was supposed to work: he was supposed to be stronger, to be smarter, to be better. He was physically strong enough to take on most hermits one-on-one if given good enough incentive (which had yet to happen, considering he was more likely to turn and flee), smart enough to fully communicate and rationalize on the same level as a player (although he still struggled with finding the correct words and never quite seemed to overcome his stuttering), and… well, being “better” is relative.

He knew that the other shadows improved with each death. He’d heard about Joe’s shadow, Killjoy, and about how he deliberately fought Joe and had him kill him again and again so he could rise from the ashes stronger in a never-ending cycle. He knew about Biffa’s shadow, Apex, and how he had evolved to become far more than the sparring partner his summoner had been hoping for as each death brought him closer to the ideal of the ultimate predator he’d gotten his name from. Both of them were fixated on evolution, on refining themselves, on pushing themselves to the absolute limit in search of a way to surpass it.

The idea was insane to him. Willingly dying, over and over, in hopes of some unreachable goal on the other side. But, then again, as far as shadows went Shadoc was an atypical one. Ever since Doc and Stress had saved him from the trap, a single thought had overridden his built-in drive to kill, to improve, to challenge: ** _I don't want to die_**. He wasn't like Murmur, who had dedicated himself to protecting his summoner despite his base nature. He wasn't like Solo or the Vex, either, who despite having their own goals would still attack their summoners like the hostile mobs they were.

His ideal of "better" didn't involve being remade from the ground up with the help of a diamond sword. What it _ did _ involve he wasn't sure, but Shadoc was alive and very much intending to stay that way, thanks.

...Except for the part where he'd died.

The door creaked open. Shadoc tensed up, heart pounding in his chest; on instinct, he brought his arms up over his head to shield himself as he scrunched into as small a form as he could manage without sinking into the floor. Footsteps echoed in the emptiness of the room and reverberated through the floor under him. They stopped just short of him, then there was a rustle of fabric as the person crouched down.

"Hey," Doc said in a soft voice. "Are you OK?'

As the hermit waited, Shadoc uncurled and looked at him with barely-open eyes. "**I think so.**" He didn't make an effort to get up this time; with his luck, he'd be facedown again soon anyway. Doc nodded. "**What… happened?**"

His summoner's expression darkened. "You don't need to worry about it," he stated in a tone that left no room for objections. "Just know that it won't happen again. You're safe."

He'd always had trouble meeting his summoner's eyes. Doc didn't take any offense to him looking away and focusing instead on the pattern of stone underneath him. "**Sorry,**" he managed. "**Sorry for—**"

"Don't apologise!" Doc's hand stopped short of grabbing him by the arm. Shadoc turned his head to stare at him with wide-eyed alarm; after a moment, Doc settled for resting his hand on Shadoc's upper arm as he continued. "If you're going to apologise to me because I had to 'go through the trouble', then don't. It wasn't your fault. You were just trying to help."

_ Just trying to _

Doc's hand became a steadying weight as Shadoc locked up. The dissociation and vertigo hit again, just as hard before, but now he knew _ why _ . He scrambled to pull the pieces together even as everything else became a tangled mess; everything narrowed down to just him, to just him and Doc, and when he came to again—

Ah. Yeah, it was good that he hadn't tried to get up. Doc took his shadow by the wrists and carefully moved his arms from where he'd reflexively braced himself, then started counting. "One, two, three, four— Shadoc, look at me. _ One, two, three, four…_"

He shook his head and held up a hand to stop Doc in his tracks. "**I'm okay,**" he croaked. "**I'm… I… where is…?**"

"Murmur?" He couldn't read Doc's expression. "He's… fine. Upset, but fine."

"**No…**" He dragged his legs under him into an unsteady crouch, leaning heavily on his robotic arm as he tried to think of where to go next. He needed to stand up. He was tired of being on the floor. Doc hooked his arms under his shadow's and, after he didn't protest, helped lift him upright. "**I— Where's— Where's Jigsaw?**"

Doc's fists clenched as he pulled away. "_Dead,_" he hissed. "And will be for a while, if Grian knows what's good for him. You'd think he'd _ stop _ summoning that monster after what it keeps doing—"

He reined himself back in. Shadoc watched as his summoner forced his fists to unclench, forced himself to relax, forced all that anger into a molotov cocktail he was probably going to throw at someone later. The thing was… Shadoc agreed. He hadn't been there when Grian's shadow had kidnapped Mumbo, but he'd been there for the aftermath: Murmur constantly stressed, refusing to leave his summoner alone for even a moment, even getting aggressive at other shadows and hermits for posing a potential threat. He had nearly lashed out at Shadoc, too, and while the most he'd done before catching himself was fire a full-fury glare, the typically soft-spoken, soft-hearted shadow had been left struggling with an emotion he was becoming rather familiar with despite his best attempts.

Shadoc was angry. Not at Murmur— he could _ never _ be angry at Murmur. Sometimes at Doc, although if his summoner was a pro at bottling his emotions Shadoc was trying to be a gold medal finalist in the Olympics when it came to this side of him. No, Shadoc was angry— No, Shadoc was absolutely _ livid _ at Jigsaw. After seeing Murmur's response, and after learning what had happened— _ kidnapped Mumbo, tortured him, left him where no one would find him_— Shadoc had wanted to ruin the life of whoever had hurt his closest friend.

So he'd tried. He'd found Jigsaw taunting Murmur about his supposed failure to protect his summoner, and something in him had snapped. The most warning Jigsaw got was a roar of pure, unbridled rage before Shadoc launched himself at him and punched him in the face as hard as he could. Murmur had cried out in shock as he'd grabbed Grian's shadow by the jumper, snarling, and the look of shock and fear on the little bastard's face had been so rewarding, but—

But Shadoc had been summoned with no gear, no weapons, no anything, while Grian had been decked out to kill until his shadow had gotten the upper hand. Raw physical strength only got him so far, up until Jigsaw managed to escape him— taunting, mocking, sword clashing against him, digging into his arm, his side, until the pain overrode everything and he'd collapsed, feeling himself start to pull apart at the seams, Murmur screaming, then—

** _ Bye-bye!_ **

"Shadoc," Doc snapped. He jerked back to reality hard enough to give him whiplash: his summoner was holding him tight by the arms, face close to his, expression worried. "He's not here, okay? He's not here. No one's going to hurt you."

The unstable flickering particles around him settled down into a less erratic pattern as Shadoc grounded himself. The feeling in his chest of being wound up too tight, of being about to break, unraveled into nothingness. Jigsaw was gone. He was okay, _ Murmur _ was okay, and…

He faltered. "**I couldn't… I… I tried to stop— to— to—**" Shadoc shook his head as he tried to push through, tried to stop sounding like a skipping record. "**I tried,**" he said, defeated. "**I tried.**"

Doc looked at him. Shadoc was still learning to read his expressions— it was something that should've come naturally to him, but like everything else about him it had gone awry with the mob farm and wanting nothing to do with him for the longest time— but he looked… sad. Not in an "about to cry" way, or even in a disappointed way. "You tried," he echoed. "You— You did your best."

The awkward silence lingered between them and felt like it was going to crush him. He couldn't make a sound, couldn't do anything but stand there, as Doc looked at him with that specific kind of sadness he couldn't place. Pity, maybe. Regret, maybe.

"I… got you something," Doc said. The oppressive silence fragmented and broke apart. Shadoc jolted back to attention as his summoner backed up, then held out a hand. He mimicked the gesture, confused, then jumped as a trident appeared in Doc's hand; something within him reacted, something instinctual, and without much thought he summoned a perfect mirror. He glanced at it, taking a moment to look over the black-and-gold weapon he now possessed, then his eyes darted back to Doc with dawning fear.

"**You're— You're seriously— You're going to kill me?**" he asked, incredulous. That was what shadows were _ for _ , after all; everything else was just a side effect. Now that he was aware of it, he could sense that his once-empty inventory was full of other useful items Doc would surely want duplicates of; was his summoner really going to stab him in the back like this?

Doc shook his head frantically. "**_NO_**! No, those— those are _ yours_. You know… in case you need them."

Shadoc hefted the trident. It felt natural in his hands; Doc had taken to the weapons quickly, he knew, and that combined with it being something he spawned with meant that it felt as natural to him as an extension of a limb. He squinted a little as he caught a glimpse of a purple shimmer on Doc's own. "**This… this is… It's a channeling trident?**"

"It's the best one I have," Doc said, and it clicked. This… was an apology. _ Sorry I didn't save you in time, maybe these will help. _

He wasn't sure what to say. Shadoc opened his mouth, struggled to make anything besides a basic sound, then held his trident close to him like he was afraid Doc would change his mind and take it away. "**Thanks,**" he said once his voice worked again. "**Th- Thanks—**"

Doc smiled, just a little, and put his trident away. Shadoc kept a tight hold on his own, still convincing himself that it was real and not just an excuse for Doc to pick up from where he'd left off. “Murmur’s outside,” he explained. “I managed to convince him that I needed to talk to you first… but you should let him know you’re okay.”

Regret burrowed into him. _ Murmur had watched him die_. Shadoc couldn’t even imagine how the other shadow must have felt; he gripped the trident tight enough to hurt, then shoved it back into his inventory. “**Okay,**” he said, voice wavering. “**I— Okay. Yeah. I… Okay.**”

He shouldered past Doc and moved to the door. Doc watched him go, then walked up behind him and put a hand on his shoulder as his shadow went to open the door. “Wait—” Shadoc froze. Doc waited— _ one, two, three, four_— then Shadoc relaxed and looked over his shoulder at him. “...please be careful,” Doc said gently. “I don’t want to have to resummon you again.”

Shadoc stared at him, then gave him a weak smile. “**I’ll try,** ” he said with a somewhat self-deprecating laugh. “**B- Besides, I… I doubt Murmur will let me do anything that stupid again…**”

Doc chuckled. “He better not,” he said with fake intensity.

The second Shadoc opened the door, something charged through the doorway and tackled him. He screamed as he was knocked back; his attacker had grabbed him roughly, arms tight around him, and he struggled in desperation. Unable to flee, Shadoc instead decided to fight: his trident was back in his hand before he even really thought about it, but with his arms pinned to his sides he couldn’t attack, couldn’t do anything, couldn’t—

His attacker gasped and released him as soon as he screamed. His attacker— no, it was Murmur. Murmur had startled him, that was all. He wasn’t in danger. It was just his friend. The trident vanished from his hand just as quickly as it had appeared, and Shadoc threw his arms around Murmur in a bear hug that caught the other shadow off guard.

“**Sorry,**” Murmur apologised. Shadoc couldn’t tell what for— if it was for startling him, if it was for not being there when he’d been resummoned, if it was for not being able to stop Jigsaw-- but shook his head and tightened the hug enough for Murmur to struggle and try and get him to let go.

“**Sorry,**” Shadoc echoed with a small, awkward smile as he released him. “**But… but you don’t— you don’t need to apologize, I- I promise. It’s… it’s okay.**”

Murmur didn’t look convinced. Shadoc couldn’t blame him. “**It’s okay,**” he stressed. “**I’m… I’m okay.**” The smile on his face became less awkward, more genuine, as the nonverbal shadow checked him over to make sure that he was okay, that he’d been resummoned fine. “**What about you…?**”

_ Better now that you’re safe, _ Murmur signed. _ I was worried…  
_

“**S- Sorry…**” Guilt washed over him. It’d been so stupid of him to attack Jigsaw like that, but… “**I couldn’t… I… I couldn’t just— I couldn’t— ...he was hurting you.**” There it was— that flicker of anger, like a fire trying to start. Shadoc stomped it down. “**I don’t know if I regret it,**” he said, barely audible. “**I- I regret that it… failed… but. But hitting him felt...**”

Murmur placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. Shadoc sighed. He felt… a lot of things, all at once. He felt scared that he’d died. He felt guilty that Murmur had been hurt worse because of him. He felt angry that Jigsaw had hurt Murmur, and felt angry that he’d been killed just to twist the knife in the wound. He felt frustrated that, despite how hard he’d fought, he’d still lost.

...Maybe _ that _ was why some of the other shadows wanted to get stronger. Humiliation and the need to protect something you care about could be powerful motivations, and he felt both of those rather strongly now. His core motivation was still there— ** _I don’t want to die_**— but now it was bolstered with _ I’m not going to die, because if he hurts Murmur again _ ** _ I’m going to kill him first._ **

Shadoc was one of the strongest shadows on the server, only outclassed by Apex and Killjoy. With this most recent death, he was now better than he was before.

Secretly, Shadoc couldn’t wait for the next time Jigsaw tried to attack him or Murmur and got hit by lightning.


End file.
